Mount Wilson Observatory is proud to present Small Paintings of Infinity by James Griffith,
an exhibition of work evoking the poetic that all life and evolution of the cosmos are intertwined.
Installed in the historic 100-inch telescope dome at Mount Wilson Observatory
The public is invited to an opening reception, July 13, 2025 | 2-5pm
Reception is Free & Open to the Public
Exhibition is open Saturdays July 19 through October 26 2025 | 1-5PM
Exhibition Admission: $5
PLEASE NOTE: Access to the dome exhibition level is via a 53-step staircase. Mount Wilson Observatory is a mile high in elevation so the air is noticeably thinner. There is no ADA-compliant access.
James Griffith
Small Paintings of Infinity
In May 1916, the director of L.A.’s Museum of History, Science and Art wrote a letter to solar astronomer and Mount Wilson Observatory founder George Ellery Hale, seeking his endorsement for the scientific preservation of fossil beds at Rancho La Brea. After a couple of months, Hale responded with an apology for the delay and an enthusiastic vote of support for the protection of what later became known as the La Brea Tar Pits. Hale had good reason for his slow reply, as it was during the last stages of construction on Mt. Wilson’s 100-inch Hooker telescope, which saw first light on November 1, 1917. Now, a century-plus later, the resonance between an observatory that probes the deep sky for knowledge of its mysteries, and a pit that shelters the archaic secrets of the living Earth, is resurrected in the exhibition of James Griffith’s tar-based paintings installed inside Hale’s famous dome.
The science of both a telescope and a tar pit is about peering into the past, to enlighten our understanding as well as our emotional being in the present. There is virtually nothing that we see that isn’t a glimpse into what was — from our gaze at a nearby flower as it appeared a fraction of millisecond earlier, to our nearest star as it existed 8 minutes before, to the nearest galaxy of 2.5 million years ago. The light that reaches down to us from deep space is recorded data – yottabytes of memory — as is the tar that seeps up to us from deep earth. Both light and tar are relics of bound-up knowledge
waiting to be unshackled.
To paint with tar, Griffith pours thinned washes and splashes onto panels coated with titanium white, then watches the oily chaos for random accidents that suggest recognizable shapes. The raw tar is initially collected, with permission, from the La Brea Tar Pits, and with some additional chemistry and artistic alchemy it ultimately dries to a firm painted surface. Griffith named an early series using this process, “Evolution,” in which he depicted animals and plants expressive of his urgency about ecological awareness. Thus, with living forms emerging from tar, Griffith’s medium and his subject
matter became a fused metaphor.
In the celestial paintings of this exhibition, he expands the symbolism of using such archaic organic remains, evoking the poetic that all life and the evolution of the cosmos are intertwined.
Rather than being viewed as snapshots of specific known stars, galaxies, and nebula as they existed in a moment from millions or billions of years ago, Griffith’s tar-painted celestials are imaginary topographies of light imbued, by virtue of the tar he uses, with a tincture of life and change over eons. In his work is the proposition that while Earth’s living things may be conjoined to this one planet, we are also citizens of the cosmic sky
beyond.
— Stephen Nowlin, curator
More information about James Griffith can be found at: www.jamesgriffithpainting.com
James Griffith “The Radiant Sun – Origin Story,” 2024. Tar on Panel, 37 x 64 inches. Image courtesy of Craig Krull Gallery, Santa Monica.
Directions to Mount Wilson Observatory
Be aware you will need a U.S. Forest Service Adventure Pass to park at the Observatory, as it is located on U.S. Forest Service land.